micro:bit in Wonderland
micro:bit in Wonderland
Coding & Craft with the BBC micro:bit
About the Book
Are you ready for an adventure with the BBC micro:bit in Wonderland?
“Why,” said the Dodo, “the best way to explain it is to do it.” Come down the rabbit hole and modernise the White Rabbit’s pocket watch, program the Lobster Quadrille dance, create an anger monitor for the Queen of Hearts and lots more!
Create 12 interactive projects, inspired by Lewis Carroll’s classic story Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland, and learn how to program the BBC micro:bit mini computer using block-based coding. Gradually build modern skills as you learn about wearables, electronic games, e-textiles, electronics circuits, digital music, animation and much more.
The hands-on projects use simple, inexpensive electronics and everyday household and craft materials. The book provides a playful introduction for families new to coding, electronics and the BBC micro:bit. As you make each project you will develop important creative and computational thinking skills to enable you to imagine, design and create your own projects.
The projects are suitable for beginners aged 9 and over (including teens and adults). Younger children will require adult assistance, whereas older learners can work more independently using the easy-to-follow, step-by-step instructions with colour illustrations and photographs. Additional instructions, templates and bonus content are available on the accompanying website alice.techagekids.com to make things easy for parents and teachers.
About the Editor
About the Contributors
Author
Tracy first learnt to code on her Sinclair ZX Spectrum at the age of 10, this put her on the path to study Maths and Computing at the University of Bath where she won the Computing prize in her final year. Tracy Gardner has a Computer Science PhD which won a BCS Distinguished Dissertations award. She has worked as a software engineer and software architect, including working for 10 years at IBM.
Now Tracy has two children and focuses on introducing technology to the next generation. She is a director of Tech Age Kids. She also develops educational content for the Raspberry Pi Foundation. Tracy has taught Computing to Key Stage 2 children (aged 7-11) and volunteered at a Code Club and CoderDojo.
Author
Elbrie de Kock has an Interior Design degree and has worked in a number of different industries in design and marketing.
Elbrie has three children. Her eldest son’s passion for computer programming inspired her to find opportunities for kids to learn to code. She uses her creative background and newly developed technology skills to create projects that combine craft, coding and electronics.
Elbrie is a director of Tech Age Kids and develops events, workshops and content about creative technology. She volunteers at a Code Club, found the local CoderDojo and recently taught Computing in Primary Education.
Reader Testimonials
Sean McManus
Author of Cool Scratch Projects in Easy Steps
The Alice theme works well, and the integration of crafting is a great way to elevate even the simplest projects into something quite special.
Prof. Adrian Oldknow
Founder of the Cambridge Centre for Innovation in Technological Education
Lewis Carroll, aka Charles Dodgson, was an inventive genius who has caught the imagination of generations of children all over the world in his Alice’s Adventures books. In their ‘micro:bit in Wonderland’ book, Tracy Gardner and Elbrie de Kock draw on that tradition and bring it graphically into the digital era. They skillfully appeal to young learners’ imaginations and creativity, while giving them the digital tools they need to take control.
Gareth James
Chief of Education and Strategy at Micro:bit Education Foundation
When we were presented with the draft of this book it was a delight to explore. It is coherent, concise and comprehensive. It takes the readers on a learning journey but in a way that is full of fun activities, set in the context of a timeless story that is known and loved around the world.
Sian January
Software engineer and mother of two
When I first heard about the micro:bit I was fairly underwhelmed and wondered how much you could really do with 25 red LEDs and a few inputs. How wrong I was! I absolutely love the creativity of this book. Tracy and Elbrie have brought together a unique combination of skills to develop these incredible projects that most of us couldn't even dream of. I would have loved a book like this at the age of 10 or 11 (or even older!).
Anne Wan
Teacher, children’s book author and mother of three
As a Mum with a limited computer background, I often feel left behind by my children's computer knowledge. This book provides a brilliant way of engaging with my child to be creative and learn new coding skills together. Using the story of Alice in Wonderland as the context, along with the clear instructions, makes the projects easy to follow and enjoyable to make. If I can do this, anyone can!
Jane Moody
Drift Educational IT Services
Tech Age Kids have created an engaging, inspiring and visually beautiful activity book that is an absolute asset for classrooms and families alike. Teaching and playing with children in ways that incorporate technology and develop their coding skills will bring them a lot of fun now and better prepare them for the world of tomorrow.
Bethany
Child (aged 11)
I really enjoyed the activities - my favourite was the croquet.
Table of Contents
About the authors
About Tech Age Kids
Foreword by Micro:bit Education Foundation
Acknowledgements
GUIDE TO THIS BOOK
- Who is this book for?
- What will you learn?
- What you will need
- Notes for adults
- How to use this book
THE MICRO:BIT
- Programming the micro:bit
PROJECTS
Project 1: Late!
Project 2: Drink Me, Eat Me
Project 3: The Caucus Race
Project 4: Light Up Caterpillar
Project 5: The Cook and The Pepper Box
Project 6: The Cheshire Cat
Project 7: Twinkle Twinkle Little Bat
Project 8: Painting the Roses
Project 9: Pushing the Queen's Buttons
Project 10: The Croquet Match
Project 11: The Lobster Quadrille
Project 12: The Trial
ADDITIONAL PROJECTS
The Leanpub 60-day 100% Happiness Guarantee
Within 60 days of purchase you can get a 100% refund on any Leanpub purchase, in two clicks.
See full terms
Do Well. Do Good.
Authors have earned$11,974,502writing, publishing and selling on Leanpub, earning 80% royalties while saving up to 25 million pounds of CO2 and up to 46,000 trees.
Learn more about writing on Leanpub
Free Updates. DRM Free.
If you buy a Leanpub book, you get free updates for as long as the author updates the book! Many authors use Leanpub to publish their books in-progress, while they are writing them. All readers get free updates, regardless of when they bought the book or how much they paid (including free).
Most Leanpub books are available in PDF (for computers) and EPUB (for phones, tablets and Kindle). The formats that a book includes are shown at the top right corner of this page.
Finally, Leanpub books don't have any DRM copy-protection nonsense, so you can easily read them on any supported device.
Learn more about Leanpub's ebook formats and where to read them
Top Books
- #1
A Guide To The Future Of Hospitals
Dr. Bertalan MeskoFor centuries, scientists have been trying to envision the future of hospitals. Following the recent shift towards digital health technologies, in part precipitated by COVID-19, it is natural for one to wonder how these developments will impact hospitals. What can we expect from them in the future? Will there be hospitals at all in a decade’s time?
- #2
OpenIntro Statistics
David Diez, Christopher Barr, Mine Cetinkaya-Rundel, and OpenIntroA complete foundation for Statistics, also serving as a foundation for Data Science.
Leanpub revenue supports OpenIntro (US-based nonprofit) so we can provide free desk copies to teachers interested in using OpenIntro Statistics in the classroom and expand the project to support free textbooks in other subjects.
More resources: openintro.org.
- #3
CCIE SP v5.0
Łukasz Bromirski, Piotr Jablonski, and Nicholas RussoAre you striving to prepare to and pass CCIE SP lab exam? Take the opportunity and get this workbook! With the attached initial cfg files you will prepare yourself for the CCIE SP exam as well as learn SP technologies applicable to all kinds of today modern networks! This workbook covers blueprint topics and provides challenging examples.
- #4
Ansible for DevOps
Jeff GeerlingAnsible is a simple, but powerful, server and configuration management tool. Learn to use Ansible effectively, whether you manage one server—or thousands.
- #5
EZ Tools Manuals
Eric Zimmerman and Andrew RathbunEric Zimmerman's Tools are free, open-source, widely taught around the world. This is the official manual for all of his command line and GUI tools.
- #6
R Programming for Data Science
Roger D. PengThis book brings the fundamentals of R programming to you, using the same material developed as part of the industry-leading Johns Hopkins Data Science Specialization. The skills taught in this book will lay the foundation for you to begin your journey learning data science. Printed copies of this book are available through Lulu.
- #7
C++20 - The Complete Guide
Nicolai M. JosuttisAll new language and library features of C++20 (for those who know previous C++ versions).
The book presents all new language and library features of C++20. Learn how this impacts day-to-day programming, to benefit in practice, to combine new features, and to avoid all new traps.
Buy early, pay less, free updates.
Other books:
- #8
Introducing EventStorming
Alberto BrandoliniThe deepest tutorial and explanation about EventStorming, straight from the inventor.
- #9
Design and Reality
Rebecca Wirfs-Brock and Mathias Verraes - #10
D3 Start to Finish
Peter CookD3 Start to Finish shows you how to build a custom, interactive and beautiful data visualisation using the JavaScript library D3.js (versions 6 & 7).
The book covers D3.js concepts such as selections, joins, requests, scale functions, events & transitions. You'll put these concepts into practice by building a custom, interactive data visualisation.
Top Bundles
- #1
CCIE Service Provider Ultimate Study Bundle
2 Books
Piotr Jablonski, Lukasz Bromirski, and Nick Russo have joined forces to deliver the only CCIE Service Provider training resource you'll ever need. This bundle contains a detailed and challenging collection of workbook labs, plus an extensively detailed technical reference guide. All of us have earned the CCIE Service Provider certification... - #2
Software Architecture
2 Books
"Software Architecture for Developers" is a practical and pragmatic guide to modern, lightweight software architecture, specifically aimed at developers. You'll learn:The essence of software architecture.Why the software architecture role should include coding, coaching and collaboration.The things that you really need to think about before... - #3
Pattern-Oriented Memory Forensics and Malware Detection
2 Books
This training bundle for security engineers and researchers, malware and memory forensics analysts includes two accelerated training courses for Windows memory dump analysis using WinDbg. It is also useful for technical support and escalation engineers who analyze memory dumps from complex software environments and need to check for possible... - #5
Practical FP in Scala + Functional event-driven architecture
2 Books
Practical FP in Scala (A hands-on approach) & Functional event-driven architecture, aka FEDA, (Powered by Scala 3), together as a bundle! The content of PFP in Scala is a requirement to understand FEDA so why not take advantage of this bundle!? - #6
All the Books of The Medical Futurist
6 Books
We put together the most popular books from The Medical Futurist to provide a clear picture about the major trends shaping the future of medicine and healthcare. Digital health technologies, artificial intelligence, the future of 20 medical specialties, big pharma, data privacy, digital health investments and how technology giants such as Amazon... - #9
Statistics - All Lee Baker's Books
10 Books
This bundle includes all of the statistics books that Lee Baker has published at LeanPub 13 Statistics Books*1 PlaceNo Hassle! All in both epub and mobi formats - perfect for all devices and screen sizes. --------------------------------------------------------- *The book listed as Getting Started With Statistics is a bundle of 4 books...
